Unbroken
(The fourth book in the Outcast Season series)
A novel by Rachel Caine
Books by Rachel Caine
To the amazing professionals who risk their lives every day to bring those devastated by angry nature to a safe place and helping hands…
To volunteers who sacrifice their time, their money, their energy, and their safety to pull survivors from the rubble, serve up food, hand out clothes, deliver comfort, and do a thousand other things that we take for granted in our normal lives…
To all those who donate to rescue organizations and give so constantly and generously to improve the lives of those stricken…
You are my heroes.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The last book of the Outcast Season was an emotional and exhausting one, and I want to thank all of those who have loved and supported me during this amazing eight-year ride with the Weather Wardens. May your skies always be fair, my friends.
Special thanks to my husband, Cat, who bore all my hours locked in solitude with cheer, delivered caffeine at regular intervals, and never made me feel as if I was neglecting him, even when it was true. Love you, sweetie.
I also have to thank Claire, Griffin, and Nicola in New Zealand, and Felicity in Australia, all of whom made my journey down under so amazingly fun. THANK YOU!
WHAT HAS GONE BEFORE
MY NAME IS CASSIEL, and I was once a Djin—a being as old as the Earth herself, rooted in her power. I cared little for the scurrying human creatures who busied themselves with their small lives.
Things have changed. Now I
I find myself caring too much about Luis, and his niece, Isabel, and others who never would have mattered before. The leader of the Old Djinn tells me that I must destroy humanity to save the Djinn, and all other life on Earth. I do not believe that. I cannot.
I have become too… human.
Before, that would have seemed like a curse.
Now I believe it may be a blessing.
But it will take all I have, all I have
Chapter 1
ON THE MORNING of the end of the world, I woke up curled beneath the cover of fallen leaves. It was extraordinarily quiet that morning, a hush like nothing I’d ever heard before… the calm that falls before the storm, but this storm, when it came, would never pass.
Not for us.
For most of a million years, the planet beneath me, the pulsing, living Earth herself, had been silent—not dead, but dormant, like a long-sleeping volcano. The past few years had seen warning signs… explosions of violence, as if she had been restless in her dreams. But just yesterday, something wondrous and terrible happened: She awoke in pain.
The quiet around me now was not peace. It was the indrawn breath before the scream.
I lay still for a few moments, savoring the silence. A bird’s wings flapped somewhere in the distance, and condensation tapped on leaves as it slipped from tree branches overhead. The sun was rising, tinting the low-lying mist a soft orange.
I was cold, wet, and afraid, but I felt a precious moment of peace. I could almost believe it was the beginning of the world, the beginning of hope, the beginning of everything.…
